Oh-oh! Time for another Border Crossing!!
Costa Rica to Nicaragua Frontera at Penas Blancas (not a typo) is infamous for its chaos - we got there early. 8:00am and Costa Rica Migracion queue just 20 people - phew - made it before the international buses. Minor kerfuffle as their Exit Fee card payment machine not working - quick dash into no mans land where two blokes behind bars in a tin hut hand over the required vouchers for a few Colones - and we're stamped out. Pablo's Costa Rica exit stamp takes no time at all once we find the deserted Aduana Office 500 metres back up the road and we drive through to Nicaragua where the anticipated chaos doesn't disappoint!
No signs, no uniforms, no officials, no offices - just a mega queue! Plenty of hawkers and border touts, and lots of shacks offering drinks/ food/ plastic sandals - anywhere doing passport stamps?
Amanda joins the mega queue before just before another busload arrive, and I head along the line and through the door to find out if this is Nicaragua Migracion? Yes, confirm three separate Gringos in three separate lines where the queue snake splits into six!
And I'm off to find Nicaragua Aduana and get Pablo's paperwork sorted. It's a long haul involving zig zags across the chaotic compound at least ten times including stops at various Cafe Shacks where the Border Officials sit, drinking coffee, smoking cigs and for just a couple of US$ (each) add official stamps to Pablo's Import Permit. Somewhere along the way I picked up a Happy Helper who guides me through the maze and after only one and a half hours Pablo's done. Amanda meanwhile has neared the head of the Medusa Migracion queue and we are reunited to wait in line whilst a dozen women and children push in front of us! We glare at them and complain to the Migracion Officer, who ignores us and we wait some more to pay $12 each to enter the land of chaos!
No Desayuno yet - and already 11:00am - against our travel ethics we pull over at Burger King in Rivas, for a Whopper with side order of WiFi. And find a lovely place to stay in the historic town of Granada, founded in 1524, one of the oldest towns in the Spanish New World.
Hotel Palacio Real is a treat - peaceful and calm after Frontera chaos. Entertained by the wobbly workmen balanced atop a makeshift scaffold outside the Hotel, we relax on our balcony with a glass of vino. They are putting up a huge illuminated Hotel Palacio Real sign in between fag breaks whilst traffic swerves their scaffold tower whose legs block half the carriageway!
